When the Trump administration decided in 2019 to withdraw U.S. forces in the region, Turkish forces and allied Syrian militants followed with a major offensive against the SDF. Kurdish officials then called the U.S. move a “stab in the back.”
Joe Biden has overseen the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and pulled back the Pentagon’s mission in Iraq amid domestic and regional pressure.
But in Syria, the U.S. military remains with no discernable exit plan.
For minority Kurds in Iraq and Syria who have found the presence of U.S. troops essential for their protection, watching the extraordinary images of desperate Afghans clinging to a U.S. aircraft as it took off has prompted serious questions about their future.
Nawaf Khalil, director of the Germany-based Kurdish Center for Studies said that it was unlikely for Washington to pull U.S. troops from Syria, because unlike Afghanistan, where nearly 20 years of conflict with the Taliban has cost the U.S. more than 2,300 deaths and billions of dollars, the United States’ involvement in Syria, which has lasted nearly seven years, has been minimal and has proven very effective in countering terrorism.
